IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v14y2022i22p15402-d977936.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Contamination and Environmental Risk Assessment of Potentially Toxic Elements in Soils of Palm Farms in Northwest Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Author

Listed:
  • Saad S. Alarifi

    (Department of Geology and Geophysics, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia)

  • Abdelbaset S. El-Sorogy

    (Department of Geology and Geophysics, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia)

  • Khaled Al-Kahtany

    (Department of Geology and Geophysics, College of Science, King Saud University, P.O. Box 2455, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia)

  • Mislat Alotaibi

    (Department of Geosciences, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR 72704, USA)

Abstract

Thirty-four surface soil samples were collected from the palm farms of the Al-Ammariah area, northwest Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to assess the contamination and environmental risk of potentially toxic elements (PTEs). Aluminum (Al), arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), cobalt (Co), chromium (Cr), copper (Cu), iron (Fe), mercury (Hg), manganese (Mn), nickel (Ni), lead (Pb), antimony (Sb), strontium (Sr), uranium (U), vanadium (V), and zinc (Zn) were analyzed using inductively coupled plasma–atomic emission spectroscopy (ICP–AES). Several pollution indices were employed to assess contamination and to evaluate the environmental risks of these PTEs. Average values (mg/kg) for Cr (19.97), Pb (5.08), Cu (11.36), Zn (52.16), Ni (26.94), Co (3.89), and V (18.94) were under the values recorded for soils globally, while the average values of Hg (0.50) and U (8.06) were greater than the average values of worldwide soils. Pollution indices indicated that the studied soils exhibited indications of severe enrichment and significant contamination with Hg, and moderately severe enrichment with U and As. The potential ecological (RI) findings indicated a moderate level of risk posed by PTEs in the study area. The potentially toxic elements originated from both natural and human sources, largely due to chemical weathering of the neighboring mountains, in addition to the widespread utilization of insecticides and fertilizers.

Suggested Citation

  • Saad S. Alarifi & Abdelbaset S. El-Sorogy & Khaled Al-Kahtany & Mislat Alotaibi, 2022. "Contamination and Environmental Risk Assessment of Potentially Toxic Elements in Soils of Palm Farms in Northwest Riyadh, Saudi Arabia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(22), pages 1-12, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:22:p:15402-:d:977936
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/22/15402/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/22/15402/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Qingzhen Yao & Xiaojing Wang & Huimin Jian & Hongtao Chen & Zhigang Yu, 2015. "Characterization of the Particle Size Fraction associated with Heavy Metals in Suspended Sediments of the Yellow River," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-20, June.
    2. Qing Xia & Jiquan Zhang & Yanan Chen & Qing Ma & Jingyao Peng & Guangzhi Rong & Zhijun Tong & Xingpeng Liu, 2020. "Pollution, Sources and Human Health Risk Assessment of Potentially Toxic Elements in Different Land Use Types under the Background of Industrial Cities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-19, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Talal Alharbi & Abdelbaset S. El-Sorogy, 2022. "Risk Assessment of Potentially Toxic Elements in Agricultural Soils of Al-Ahsa Oasis, Saudi Arabia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-12, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Mahsa Tashakor & Reza Dahmardeh Behrooz & Seyed Reza Asvad & Dimitris G. Kaskaoutis, 2022. "Tracing of Heavy Metals Embedded in Indoor Dust Particles from the Industrial City of Asaluyeh, South of Iran," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(13), pages 1-19, June.
    2. Jie Zeng & Guilin Han & Qixin Wu & Yang Tang, 2019. "Heavy Metals in Suspended Particulate Matter of the Zhujiang River, Southwest China: Contents, Sources, and Health Risks," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(10), pages 1-16, May.
    3. Keyu Li & Dong Liu & Zhiqiang Qiu & Mengwei Duan & Xiaodao Wei & Hongtao Duan, 2024. "Human Management Decreased Suspended Particle Size in the Loess Plateau Rivers during the 1980s to the 2010s," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-19, January.
    4. Guoqi Lian & Xinqing Lee, 2021. "Concentrations, Distribution, and Pollution Assessment of Metals in River Sediments in China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(13), pages 1-20, June.
    5. Wenbing Luo & Zhongping Deng & Shihu Zhong & Mingjun Deng, 2022. "Trends, Issues and Future Directions of Urban Health Impact Assessment Research: A Systematic Review and Bibliometric Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(10), pages 1-23, May.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:22:p:15402-:d:977936. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.